George Clooney’s Latest Role? Beating Malaria

George Clooney conducts an interview in the southern Sudanese capital city of Juba. He is flanked by John Prendergast, left, an American analyst of African conflicts and the director of the ENOUGH campaign.

George Clooney doesn’t waste time: the 49-year-old has not only contracted but already recovered from the potentially life-threatening bout of malaria he contracted while in Sudan recently. Indeed, his publicist Stan Rosenfield confirmed it was a sequel of sorts, as this is the second time Clooney has gone toe-to-toe with the disease.

He was over in December working on a project with the U.N. and Google to help to stave off the possibility of a new civil war and was back last week. It’s reported he caught malaria on both occasions. Clooney has an impressive track record of attempting to raise awareness over alleged genocide and other human rights violations. What’s more, he feared that he contracted malaria during a visit to Darfur back in 2006 but his weight loss and exhaustion were due to blood poisoning.

The main beneficiary of this scoop is CNN’s newest hope, Piers Morgan, who has Clooney on his show tonight (the interview was taped on January 13). And while the Oscar-winning star was his typical humorous self — “I guess the mosquito in Juba looked at me and thought I was the bar” — he also tells Morgan that this illustrates how important it is to find a cure. Proper medication, said Clooney, can turn “the most lethal condition in Africa” into “a bad 10 days instead of a death sentence.” (via AP)